Failings
by HeadlessHuntsman
Summary: Harry meets someone in a bar he has not seen for years, and it has consequences for his marriage.
1. Closure

**A/N: This fits into my HeadCanon. Draco Malfoy is a private solicitor who works with the Aurors from time to time. This was written in response to The Weekly Insanity Challenge on the Teacher's Lounge. I have decided to turn this into a multichapter where I will explore Harry and Ginny's relationship.**

**Disclaimer: I own none of what you recognize and (checking his account balance) I'm not JKR**

**Closure**

Harry rolled over and sat up. He looked over at the sleeping form next to him.

_'How the hell did this happen?' _he asked himself.

The woman next to him was not his wife of 15 years, but rather a woman he had not seen since school. Until last night, that is. He had finished working on a tough case with Malfoy, and they had gone out for a drink to decompress. He saw her dancing and couldn't believe his eyes. Last he had heard she was working with the Australian Ministry. He watched her as she approached the bar, and felt something flutter in his chest. He hadn't felt that way in a long time.

"Cho?," he called out questioningly, even though he was sure it was her.

"Oh my Merlin, Harry?" she exclaimed, hugging him without reservation.

"What are you doing here..." Harry tried to talk over the noise.

She shook her head and leaned closer to his ear. He shivered as he felt her breath on his ear.

"Let's go out to the patio," she invited. Harry nodded and they left through the side door, holding their drinks.

Once they were outside, and seated at a small table, they could talk without having to raise their voices.

"What are you here for?" Harry asked, starting the conversation. "Last I heard, you were in Australia."

"I still work there," she said. "I'm just back for Marietta's wedding."

"Edgecombe?" Harry asked.

She nodded. "It's some ministry bloke. Really very boring."

After explaining that the bachelorette party had come to the bar and hotel for an all night party, they lapsed into an uncomfortable silence.

"So how are you doing?" she asked, looking over the top of her glass.

Harry was startled by the question. A summer breeze had picked up drying the sweat from the closeness of the bar. The cool breeze was having a noticeable effect on Cho, who had worn a flimsy white top without a bra; this, in turn, was having a noticeable effect on Harry's ability to concentrate.

"Hmm? What was that?" Harry asked, having not heard the question.,

"I asked how you were doing," she said, leaning back in her chair and crossing her legs.

"I'm doing good," he said. "Kids are healthy and being kids, Ginny is working for the Prophet and I am still an Auror."

"You sell yourself short," she correct him. "You're the Head Auror." Harry wasn't sure if it was his imagination or wishful thinking, but it seemed that she put extra emphasis on the word head.

"What about you?" Harry asked. "How do you like Australia? "

"Oh, it's okay," Cho said leaning further back and stretching her arms above her head.

_'Now, she's just being mean,'_ Harry thought.

Cho smiled almost as if she could read Harry's mind.

"I love my job and the weather's not nearly as glum as here," she took a small drink and licked her lips.

"So anybody special," he asked.

"Oh, they're all special in one way or another," she grinned, her tinkling laughter sending chills down Harry's spine.

They ordered a few more drinks and began to talk more openly with Cho finally broaching the subject they were both wondering.

"Did you ever wonder what if?" she asked him.

"Not really," he answered honestly, "but seeing you here now I am," he smiled slyly.

She smiled as if she had won some sort of argument.

"I have, you know," she said, draining the last of her drink, "wondered what if, that is."

She stood up stretched again.

"I think I am going to go up to my room and call it a night," she said, not looking away from Harry's eyes.

Harry nodded and took a sip of his drink.

Cho turned started to walk to the stairs that went up the outside of the building to the rooms.

"Are you coming?" she asked looking back over her shoulder.

Harry should have felt an internal conflict. He should have thought about Ginny and his love for her. But all he felt was that interminable flutter, that had recently returned to his life, and a desire to explore those unanswered questions.

Harry stood up and walked to Cho and kissed her. It was not at all like their previous kiss, when they were young innocent teens exploring. This was a kiss into which they both poured the passion and frustrations of years of longing.

Harry didn't quite remember how they made it to Cho's room. He did remember their night once they got to the room though. He remembered her beauty and her body. He remembered watching her eyes as the waves of beautiful agony swept through her. And he remembered falling into a deep sleep holding her without promises of love or a future.

Sitting on the end of the bed Harry realized that this was what they both needed; a kind of release from responsibility.

She stirred, rolled over and opened one eye.

"You're still here," she said not as a question but more as a statement of reassurance, as if she thought their actions might send him into a suicidal spiral.

"I need to get going home," he said., standing and putting on his boxers, before sitting back on the edge of the bed.

She smiled and reached out her hand to his cheek then sat up, covering herself modestly.

Harry grinned. People are funny just a few hours earlier they were undressing each other in the hallway.

"Yes you do, thank you," she said.

"For what?" he asked not expecting this response from her.

"Closure."


	2. Human

**A/N: This is the second chapter to a one shot that I wrote as a submission to a challenge. I just could not leave the story where I had ended it.**

**Human**

It took Harry about 5 hours for the gravity, of what had happened, to sink in. Following on the heels of the realization, was that ever present voice. The one that had resided in Harry's soul since he was a child. It said he wasn't worthy, that he had betrayed the first person to love him, he deserved to be alone and he would be once Ginny found out he had cheated on her. He had given in to temptation. He had been tempted before and never been weak; even that horrible summer they were broken up he had remained faithful.

The worst part was, he didn't even know why he had cheated. It wasn't like they had been fighting or had grown apart. Sure his job was tough to deal with, and Ginny hated it sometimes. There wasn't as much passion in their marriage as there once was. Everyone said that was to be expected. Looking back, it felt as if it were someone else in his skin. That would be so easy; to blame his weakness on a spell someone had cast. He knew this wasn't the case. He had been selfish and wrong in his actions, and knew that whatever happened he owed Ginny the truth.

-ooo-

I took a week for Harry to summon his remaining Gryffindor courage, and decide to face his actions, by telling Ginny.

He came home from working and found the house without children.

"Where are the kids," he asked Ginny, after finding her in the sitting room.

"I asked mum to take them tonight," she said. "We need to talk."

"I was thinking the same thing," Harry said, sitting in a chair next to her.

They both started talking at the same time, and looked shocked that the other had something to say.

"Please," he said, "let me go first. If I don't, I'm not sure I will be able to talk."

Ginny nodded, looking nervous and worried.

"I don't know where to start," he said, not looking at her. "I love you and you mean so much to me. I thought I would never do anything to jeopardize that... but I did."

He watched her out of the corner of his eye as she sat, stone faced, listening.

"It was after that last case..." he started to explain.

"The Red Rose Killer?" she asked.

"Please, don't call him that," he. pleaded. "That was the press's idea. I don't want to give that bastard the satisfaction. Anyway, the team went out to relax and decompress and... I wish I could say why it happened. I just don't know. Maybe it was the relief of it being over or maybe it was just my usual self-destructiveness. I don't know," he wiped a tear from his cheek. "I do know that I don't want to lose you and, while I don't deserve it I hope I haven't destroyed...us."

Ginny took a sip of a drink from the nearby table.

"You may not feel that way in a few minutes," she said. "I understand, I really do. There was just so much pain and emotion inside and it exploded out."

She looked at him sitting in the chair and looking deflated.

"You've been so strong and everyone's hero for so long, that I am not surprised something like this happened," she said swallowing against her tears and pain. "You're not a superhero you are..were human," she paused weighing what she was going to say next, "I was human too."

Harry's head whipped around, and he looked at her in disbelief.

"It was last month. Remember that party at the prophet? The one for my promotion to editor," she said clarifying, not accusing.

"I said I was sorry I wasn't there," Harry interrupted.

"I know you did, but that didn't make it hurt less," she said. "I know what your job is and I accept it. It just seems most of the time we come second to it. There are times you're so damn busy being everyone's hero, that you quit being my husband," she paused to let her words sink in. "I don't have an excuse anymore than you do. I was feeling alone and might have had too much to drink. I did know what I was doing though."

They both sat silent for a few minutes, thinking about the revelations the evening had brought. The only sound being the family clock counting the seconds.

"So, what now?" Harry broke the silence.

"I don't know," Ginny answered; her voice almost inaudible. "We've both been hurt and hurt each other."

Harry stood up and held out his arms. Ginny gasped and stood to meet him.

"I've never been one to give up," Harry said holding her, "and you mean more to me than anything. I am going to fight."

Ginny nodded burying her face in Harry's shirt.

"It won't be easy. We have so many issues." Ginny said, her voice showing worry.

"Gee, I wonder what it will be like to have to do something difficult for a change?" Harry said, smiling his lopsided smile.

"Prat," Ginny said, still holding on to him.

And so it was then and there that it happened. It wasn't on a windswept beach or in a mountain meadow, but rather there in that small sitting room on the worst day of their relationship, that Harry and Ginny Potter decided that their marriage was the most important thing in the world, and truly worth fighting for.

.


End file.
